Tuesday, September 30, 2014

ElliptiGo World Champs

ElliptiGo World Championships – Palomar Mountain CA

I got up a bit early on race morning and headed out for an easy 5 mile run on the Inland Rail Trail in Escondido. I wanted to make sure I’d get my mileage in and wasn’t exactly sure how much warm-up I’d do at the ElliptiGo World Championships.

I headed over and got my loaner “Go” and made sure that all systems were “Go”. The only other participants I knew were Simon Gutierrez (Mt Washington hall of fame member) and Rusty Snow (2-time Go champion and formerly kicked my ass a bunch of times when he lived in New England). I did an easy 2 mile ride to the start line and watched the early waves head out. Each wave was based on expected finishing time and I would be heading out in the final group of 8 (sub-1:25).

I had no idea how fast I could go, I’ve done some climbs and I’ve done some long rides but I’ve never raced the Go and certainly never raced up a course like this. The 11.7 mile course had 4,200’ of climb at a pretty steady grade. I chatted a bit with Simon and he was looking to break 1:20 which was what I hoped to do as well.

Our group headed out with all of us together for the first ½ mile. I thought “this isn’t too bad”, and then ZOOM..Rusty took off and three guys went with him. I hung with Simon and Mike Dyon (a 2:14 marathoner from Canada), but found the going to be tough. Every time I shifted into 2nd gear they drifted away, I’d shift into 3rdand work my way back to them. I just couldn’t find a comfortable groove but I told myself that I had to stay with them for the first 5 miles. At 5 we turned onto South Grade road and the climb got a bit tougher (350’ per mile). I felt pretty good at first and even took the lead of our group for ½ mile, but Mike and Simon re-passed me and dropped me.

I kept them within 30-45 seconds for the next couple of miles but just couldn’t close the gap. At 8 miles Mike dropped Simon and they both moved out of sight. The last three miles had a little over 400’ of climb per mile and I slowed about a minute a mile slower than the previous three miles. I was giving all I had but was slowing down for sure. Up until the final 3 I thought I’d still be in the low 1:20’s but in the final miles I was just hoping to keep it under 1:25.

I reached the line in 1:24:45 for 10th place overall and 3rdin the 50+. It certainly was a different experience! It was as hard as any mountain race I’ve done. I think that being one of the lightest riders probably hurt as the bigger guys seem to be able to get more out of the elliptical motion. No complaints, I left it all out on the course.

The ride down was WILD. I rode the brakes most of the way down and was still doing miles in the 25-28 MPH range. The 13.6 miles back to the parking lot took me just 36:31 and I hardly pedaled at all. I finished off the day with another (slow) 5 mile run on the rail trail to get some of the latic acid out.